From
Chagall Guevara, The Metro: The Mid-South's Music Monthly, February 1991:

Perkins, Nichols and Taylor, along with bassist Wade Jaynes and drummer
Mike Mead, recorded the disc at Franklin's Bennett House studio. "We wanted
to record the record in Nashville because we wanted to be a part of the
scene, we felt it was important as a contribution from our belief in the
music scene here that we taked a stand to do the record here."

"Our approach on the record," says Taylor, "was to take the sonic
ambiance of that house...there's a lot of big rooms, a victorian-styled
mansion, and to not use the same set of digital boxes which tend to get
used no matter what kind of record that you're making. So even though this
is a five piece band, we did it on all forty-eight tracks in order to catch
all of these different ambiances. When we actually mixed the record, we
didn't use any digital reverbs at all, to try to give the record a
different sound."

"It's gotten to the point where everyone uses the same tools in the
recording process," says Perkins. "You listen to a really good Country
record, it sounds just like a good-sounding Rock record, which sounds like
a good-sounding Jazz record, texturally and spatially. What we wanted to
do, we worked really hard on the creation of our songs, nit-picking and
pulling them apart, and we wanted to carry this over into the recording of
them."

... "We wanted to put something that was honestly us on tape," states
Nichols. "So many bands are disappointed when they make their first
record...coming out of the studio saying, 'well, it's not quite what we are
live.' That happens more often than not. Since we place such a premium on
playing live, we are a live band, not a computer band or a band on paper,
we have the same energy, not a record that was overproduced and layered
with overdubs."

... "There's a lot of different styles on the record," says
Perkins. "I guess we have unspoken boundaries...I don't know that we've
ever said, stylistically, that too much of that is not enough...the point
is, that in describing the songs, we tried not to paint ourselves into a
corner." Every song is a three-way collaboration between Perkins, Taylor
and Nichols, thus drawing upon the talent, experience and the knowledge of
all three musicians.

"When the band started out, we decided many of these same things for the
music--no agenda. We weren't going to form a group on what we hoped to be
or what we wanted to sound like. A lot of records that are popular these
days are the same songs pretty much: same variation on one theme. We went
in with no agenda and our songwriting reflected a wide-opened attitude of
'Yeah, let's try it. Let's write a lot and record a bunch of stuff and see
how it all starts gelling.' In some ways, there's a lot of freedom in
that."

... Perkins is quick to comment, "I hope that these songs are not so
much observing or judging people as much as kind of taking or own
temperature and asking ourselves those necessary hard questions every now
and again."

... [I]n the spirit of creating something "wonderfully peculiar," the
album was done without any of the digital reverbs or samples used on most
contemporary albums. Only natural room sounds were used.

"We had worked meticulously on putting the songs together, and we wanted
to find a different path in to the recording process," adds Perkins. "We
didn't necessarily have the colors painted in, but we knew the record would
never be generic-sounding."

"Even in our dark songs, we set out to keep an optimistic slant on it
all," concludes Perkins, "and I think that hope is evident in our
presentation."

"A lot of bands do things that are more topical," says Taylor, speaking
about songwriting. "But it often gets so weighty that the art starts
disappearing and it becomes almost propaganda. One of the things that these
songs do well is that they keep enough humor and sort of sideways glances
that they don't become too weighty."

... "We're not preachers in the religious sense or in the political
sense," states Perkins. "We're artists. And if we're going to do something
topical, we want to do it artistically. Sometimes that means funny;
sometimes that means tragically gut-wrenching. We want to be able to paint
all the colors of the human experience, and hopefully paint from an
unlimited palate."

Nicholas Greco: [...] When you released Chagall
Guevara, did you intend that to be released into the Christian marketplace,
and if not, why did you change your mind on it?

ST: Right, well, no, we did not intend for it to be
released to the Christian marketplace, and we didn't actually ultimately
didn't have any say in it. Ultimately it went with Sparrow, and I was happy
that it went with them, just because I knew those people and everything
like that.

It was just simply a deal where a number of Christian labels went to MCA
directly and wanted it and offered them money. And at first MCA asked us
what we thought, and we said we would probably rather not, because we had
definitely chosen one specific path--whether it was the right thing or not,
you know, with hindsight, I don't know. But ultimately MCA just said,
"well, we're going to do this whether you want us to or not," and I was
happy it was with Sparrow.

There are certain mysteries on which Chagall Guevara's peculiar cult of
fans could forever theorize: What if they'd actually toured? What if they'd
been less of a democracy and more the servile puppets of an industry-savvy
manager? What if they'd had a name we could all pronounce? What if they
hadn't signed with MCA?

God works in mysterious ways, beloved Guevarians. Yours is not to wonder
why, yours is but to listen carefully and try to figure out just exactly
what these songs are saying. Because, despite considerable carping to the
contrary by those who want the Cliff Notes before they read the novel, all
the songs were chock full of profundity, spiritual and otherwise. And just
because that fact escaped the Manilow-weaned masses due to what I'm sure is
an internaional conspiracy, that doesn't mean you were wrong in smelling
greatness. Think of all the people who couldn't pronounce Van Gogh!

Which brings me to the point of my unseemly braggadocio. We weren't a lot
of fun to interview, because we didn't like to explain our lyrics. In
keeping with the request of the deceased, I shall do likewise.